(2008) "For years, CASA has been asking teens: 'Which is easiest for someone your age to buy: cigarettes, beer, marijuana, or prescription drugs such as OxyContin, Percocet, Vicodin or Ritalin, without a prescription?' Over the years, teens have indicated that cigarettes and marijuana are easiest to buy, followed by beer and then prescription drugs. For the first time this year, more teens told us that prescription drugs are easier to buy than beer. (Figure 3.P) and (Figure 3.Q)"

In 2008, CASA reported that 25% said cigarettes, 23% said marijuana, 19% said prescription drugs, 15% said beer, and 7% said it was the same for all.

The World Health Organization noted that, while some studies indicate that adolescents who use marijuana might be more likely to drop out of high school and experience job instability in young adulthood, "the apparent strength of these cross-sectional studies ... has been exaggerated because those adolescents who are most likely to use cannabis have lower academic aspirations and poorer high school performance prior to using cannabis, than their peers who do not."

(2003) "Most teens who use alcohol, cigarettes and marijuana do so before they are 14. Among teens who have tried alcohol, tobacco or marijuana, the average age of first use is a little more than 12 for alcohol, 12-1/2 for cigarettes, and 13 years 11 months for marijuana."

"Table 9 provides the reported instances in each offense record in which the offenders were suspected of using alcohol, computers, and/or drugs.22 The data show that such use was minimal in situations occurring at schools during the 5-year study period. Of the 589,534 offense records, reports of offenders suspected of using drugs totaled 32,366, while reports of alcohol use totaled 5,844."

"As frequency of family dinners increases, reported drinking, smoking and drug use decreases. Compared to teens who have five to seven family dinners per week, those who have fewer than three family dinners per week are more than twice as likely to have used tobacco or marijuana, and one and a half times likelier to have used alcohol."

"Our results are consistent in documenting the absence of beneficial effects associated with the DARE program. This was true whether the outcome consisted of actual drug use or merely attitudes toward drug use. In addition, we examined processes that are the focus of intervention and purportedly mediate the impact of DARE (e.g., self-esteem and peer resistance), and these also failed to differentiate DARE participants from nonparticipants. Thus, consistent with the earlier Clayton et al. (1996) study, there appear to be no reliable short-term, long-term, early adolescent, or young adult positive outcomes associated with receiving the DARE intervention."

Adolescents - Alcohol

"In 2006, more than one third (35.8 percent) of persons aged 12 to 20 who used alcohol in the past month also had used an illicit drug in the past month, and 16.0 percent of underage drinkers used an illicit drug within 2 hours of using alcohol on their last occasion of alcohol use.

Marijuana was the illicit drug most used by underage drinkers, with nearly one third (30.0 percent) having used marijuana in the past month, and 15.0 percent having used marijuana within 2 hours of their last alcohol use."

"Juveniles using drugs or alcohol committed 1 in 10 of the nonfatal violent victimizations against older teens. This was 2-1/2 times higher than the percentage of victimizations against younger teens perceived to be committed by a juvenile who was using drugs or alcohol.

"Younger teens were more likely than older teens to report that their juvenile offender was not using drugs or alcohol. In about 4 in 10 victimizations against younger and older teens committed by juveniles, the victim could not ascertain whether or not the offender was using drugs or alcohol."

"Combined data from 2002 to 2006 indicated that rates of current (past month) alcohol use were 7.0 percent for youths aged 12 to 14, 27.5 percent for youths aged 15 to 17, and 51.3 percent for 18 to 20 year olds. Binge alcohol use rates for these age groups were 3.3, 17.8, and 36.3 percent, respectively."

"Among all underage current drinkers, 31.0 percent paid for the alcohol the last time they drank, including 9.3 percent who purchased the alcohol themselves and 21.6 percent who gave money to someone else to purchase it. Underage persons who paid for alcohol themselves consumed more drinks on their last drinking occasion (average of 5.9 drinks) than did those who did not pay for the alcohol themselves (average of 3.9 drinks).

More than one in four underage drinkers (25.8 percent) indicated that on their last drinking occasion they were given alcohol for free by an unrelated person aged 21 or older. One in sixteen (6.4 percent) got the alcohol from a parent or guardian, 8.3 percent got it from another family member aged 21 or older, and 3.9 percent took it from their own home."

"The presence of alcohol in almost all of the polydrug-use repertoires and among all of the different populations addressed is one of the key findings of this ‘Selected issue’. Alcohol is almost always the first drug with strong psychoactive and mind-altering effects used by young people, and its widespread availability makes it the ever-present drug in substance combinations among young adults, particularly in recreational settings."

Adolescents - Drug Testing
"Drug testing of any kind, including for cause or suspicion, was not a significant predictor of marijuana use. These results remained for all samples, even after controlling for student demographic characteristics."

"Similar to results for marijuana use, drug testing of any kind and drug testing for cause and suspicion were not significant predictors for use of other illicit drugs among students in grades eight, 10, and 12. Within the high school subsamples, use of illicit drugs among high school male athletes and current marijuana users was not significantly different based on drug testing at the school. Even after controlling for student demographic characteristics, drug testing was not a significant predictor for other illicit drug use in any of the samples."

"Drug testing of athletes was not a significant predictor of marijuana use by male athletes in high school."

"No DAT [Drug and Alcohol Testing] deterrent effects were evident for past month use during any of four follow-up periods. Prior-year drug use was reduced in two of four follow-up self-reports, and a combination of drug and alcohol use was reduced at two assessments as well. Overall, drug testing was accompanied by an increase in some risk factors for future substance use. More research is needed before DAT is considered an effective deterrent for school-based athletes."

"In the HLM (Hierarchical Linear Modeling) analyses for students in grades eight, 10, and 12, drug testing (of any kind) was not a significant predictor of student marijuana use in the past 12 months. Neither was drug testing for cause or suspicion."

"The deterrent effect of drug and alcohol testing was present for the index of past year illicit drug use and combined drug and alcohol use, each at two follow-up time points. If DAT were to have an impact, the expected deterrent effect likely would be that the policy would alter recent (e.g., past month) use of drugs or drugs and alcohol, since student-athletes were under the threat of testing during that time period, but not during the summer months. However, no differences were noted at any of the four follow-up time points for past month indices of use of drugs or use of drugs and alcohol. With 16 opportunities overall to demonstrate a substance-use deterrent effect during 2 years and four follow-up assessments (Table 3), only four effects were significant. The significant effects for past year drug use and alcohol and drug use were not independent, as both scales included drug use."

Researchers on a grant from NIDA found that school drug testing has no impact on student drug use. According to the researchers, "Does drug testing prevent or inhibit student drug use? Members of the Supreme Court appear to believe it does. However, among the eighth-, 10th-, and 12-grade students surveyed in this study, school drug testing was not associated with either the prevalence or the frequency of student marijuana use, or of other illicit drug use. Nor was drug testing of athletes associated with lower-than-average marijuana and other illicit drug use by high school male athletes. Even among those who identified themselves as fairly experienced marijuana users, drug testing also was not associated with either the prevalence or the frequency of marijuana or other illicit drug use."

According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, "Drug testing of students is more prevalent in schools where drugs are used, kept or sold than in schools that are drug free. While only 23 percent of drug-free schools drug test students, 38 percent of non-drug-free schools conduct some type of drug testing. "Drug testing is not associated with either significantly lower risk scores or lower estimates of student body drug use. The average risk score of teens attending a school that is not drug free but has drug testing is 1.69; the average risk score of students at non-drug-free schools without drug testing is 1.50. The estimate of students using illegal drugs averages 40 percent for non-drug-free schools with testing and 34 percent at non-drug-free schools without testing."

"Denial of a college education is now an additional sanction for drug offenders as the result of two federal statutes: a 1998 law that suspends or forever terminates a drug offender’s eligibility for federal college loans and grants, and (as we shall discuss below) a 1994 law making all inmates ineligible for the Pell Grants that formerly provided the means to obtain a college degree in prison.

"The 1998 Drug Free Student Loans Act denies federal grants, federally subsidized loans, and work-study funds to college students who have been convicted of any drug offense–felony or misdemeanor, sale or possession, heroin or marijuana (but not rape, robbery, or murder)."

"The disciplinary policies in effect in many schools today apply zero tolerance to public school students in three draconian ways. First, they are blind to the most basic distinctions between types of offenses. In many schools, dangerousness is irrelevant; the penalties are the same for weapons and alcohol, sale and possession, robbery, and disorderly offenses. Offenses that used to be resolved informally with an apology or an after-school detention now lead to formal disciplinary hearings. Second, they require a severe sanction, typically suspension or expulsion, for all of these offenses, regardless of the circumstances of the offense or the intent, history and prospects of the offender. Third, these policies generally mandate some degree of information-sharing with law enforcement. This multiplies the consequences of student misconduct in two directions: out-of-school offenses referred to the child’s school may result in suspension or other sanctions,18 and in-school infractions referred to law enforcement agencies may result in juvenile or criminal prosecution."

In an ethnographic study of adolescents who were regular marijuana users, researchers at the University of British Columbia, concluded, "Thematic analysis revealed that these teens differentiated themselves from recreational users and positioned their use of marijuana for relief by emphasizing their inability to find other ways to deal with their health problems, the sophisticated ways in which they titrated their intake, and the benefits that they experienced. These teens used marijuana to gain relief from difficult feelings (including depression, anxiety and stress), sleep difficulties, problems with concentration and physical pain. Most were not overly concerned about the risks associated with using marijuana, maintaining that their use of marijuana was not 'in excess' and that their use fit into the realm of 'normal.'

Conclusion: Marijuana is perceived by some teens to be the only available alternative for teens experiencing difficult health problems when medical treatments have failed or when they lack access to appropriate health care."

"The number of offenders under age 18 admitted to prison for drug offenses increased twelvefold (from 70 to 840) between 1985 to 1997. By 1997 drug offenders made up 11% of admissions among persons under 18 compared to 2% in 1985."

Crime - Youth

There were an estimated 195,700 arrests of young people for drug abuse violations in 2007.

"Between 1990 and 1997, the juvenile arrest rate for drug abuse violations increased 145%. The rate declined 21% between 1997 and 2007, but the 2007 rate was still almost double the 1990 rate.

"Over the 1980–2007 period, the juvenile drug arrest rate for whites peaked in 1997 and then held relatively constant through 2007 (down 10%). In contrast, the rate for blacks peaked in 1995, then fell 49% by 2002. Despite the recent increase—23% since 2002—the rate in 2007 was 37% less than the 1995 peak."

"In 1980, there were an estimated 1,476 arrests of persons ages 10-12 for every 100,000 persons in this age group in the U.S. population. By 2003, this arrest rate had fallen to 1,296, a decline of 12%. In 1980, 9.5% of all juvenile arrests were arrests of persons under age 13; in 2003, this percentage had decreased to 8.5% -- with the majority of the decrease occurring during the mid-1990s."

"Table 10 shows the offense for which the arrestee was apprehended. The most common offense code reported in arrestee records was simple assault–a crime against persons, followed by drug/narcotic violations–a crime against society. These two arrest offense codes were reportedly associated with more than half (52.2 percent) of the total arrestees." These values were 51,462 "Simple Assaults" and 43,294 "Drug/Narcotics Violations" in Schools and Colleges over a five year period from 2000 through 2004. Other related counts during the same time frame were 5,108 "Drug Equipment Violations", 594 "Liquor Law Violations", 202 for "Drunkenness", and 95 for "Driving Under the Influence".

"In contrast to the 1980-1993 period, the overall juvenile drug arrest rate increased by 77% in the short period between 1993 and 1997. Large increases were also seen in the rates of juvenile subgroups: male (72%), female (119%), white (109%), American Indian (160%), and Asian (105%). The black juvenile arrest rate for drug abuse violations, which had increased dramatically in the earlier period, increased an additional 25% between 1993 and 1997. Between 1997 and 2003, the juvenile drug arrest rate fell marginally (22%), with most of the overall decline attributable to a drop in arrests of blacks (41%) and males (24%)."

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention estimated that in 2007 there were 195,700 arrests of juveniles for drug abuse violations out of a total 2,180,500 juvenile arrests. By comparison, there were 97,100 violent crime index offense arrests and 419,000 property crime index offense arrests of juveniles that year.

"Of the Nation's 72.3 million minor children in 1999, 2.1% had a parent in State or Federal prison. Black children (7.0%) were nearly 9 times more likely to have a parent in prison than white children (0.8%). Hispanic children (2.6%) were 3 times as likely as white children to have an inmate parent."

"Under the UCR Program, the FBI requires law enforcement agencies to classify an arrest by the most serious offense charged in that arrest. For example, the arrest of a youth charged with aggravated assault and possession of a controlled substance would be reported to the FBI as an arrest for aggravated assault. Therefore, when arrest statistics show that law enforcement agencies made an estimated 193,900 arrests of young people for drug abuse violations in 2004, it means that a drug abuse violation was the most serious charge in these 193,900 arrests. An unknown number of additional arrests in 2004 included a drug charge as a lesser offense."

Adolescents - Monitoring the Future Report

"A study of the effects of decriminalization by several states during the late 1970s found no evidence of any impact on the use of marijuana among young people, nor on attitudes and beliefs concerning its use. (85) However, it should be noted that decriminalization falls well short of the full legalization posited in the questions here. Moreover, the situation today is very different than it was in the late 1970s, with much more peer disapproval and more rigorous enforcement of drug laws. More recent studies suggest that there may be an impact of decriminalization, such that 'youths living in decriminalized states are significantly more likely to report currently using marijuana.'"

"Most 12th graders felt that they would be little affected personally by the legalization of either the sale or the use of marijuana. About three fifths (61%) of the respondents said that they would not use the drug even if it were legal to buy and use, while others indicated they would use it about as often as they do now (15%) or less often (1.4%). Only 5.5% said they would use it more often than they do at present, while another 8.9% thought they would try it. (Nine percent said they did not know how their behavior would be affected if marijuana were legalized.) Still, this amounts to 14.4%, or about one in seven who state that they would try marijuana, or their use would increase, if marijuana were legalized."

"As shown in Table 8-8, about equal proportions of 12th graders in 2008 believed that marijuana use should be (a) entirely legal (29%); (b) a minor violation like a parking ticket, but not a crime (30%); or (c) a crime (28%). (The remaining 13% said they 'don’t know.')

"Asked whether they thought it should be legal to sell marijuana if it were legal to use it, just over half (56%) said 'yes.' However, four fifths of those answering 'yes' (46% of all respondents) would permit the sale only to adults. Only a small minority (10%) favored the sale to anyone, regardless of age, while 31% said that sale should not be legal even if use were made legal, and 13% said they 'don’t know.'"

"In general, the more widely used drugs are reported to be available by higher proportions of the age group, as would be expected (see Tables 9-6, 9-7, and 9-8). Also, older age groups generally perceive drugs to be more available. For example, in 2008, 39% of 8th graders said marijuana would be fairly easy or very easy to get, versus 67% of 10th graders and 84% of 12th graders. In fact, for the other drugs included in the study, the proportion of students saying they are available to them is generally about twice as high among 12th graders compared to 8th graders, and three times as high for ecstasy. Both associations are consistent with the notion that availability is largely attained through friendship circles."

"Ever since the study began in 1975, between 83% and 90% of seniors each year have said that they could get marijuana fairly easily or very easily if they wanted some. It has been considerably less accessible to younger adolescents. Still, in 2008 nearly two fifths of 8th graders (39%) and two thirds of 10th graders (67%) reported it as being accessible. This compares to 84% for seniors."

The Monitoring the Future survey reports that from 1996 through 2005 more than half of the students in the United States had tried an illegal drug before they graduated from high school. In 2006, these total Lifetime Prevalence rates began to drop below 50% to stand at 47.4% in 2008.

"Annual marijuana prevalence peaked among 12th graders in 1979 at 51%, following a rise that began during the 1960s. Then use declined fairly steadily for 13 years, bottoming at 22% in 1992—a decline of more than half. The 1990s, however, saw a resurgence of use. After a considerable increase (one that actually began among 8th graders a year earlier than among 10th and 12th graders), annual prevalence rates peaked in 1996 at 8th grade and in 1997 at 10th and 12th grades. After 1996 there was a continuing gradual decline among 8th graders through 2007, with a pause in 2005. Considering the small increase in 2008, use now is down from the 1996 peak level by about two fifths. In the upper grades, only a very modest decline occurred between 1997 and 2002, followed by a continuing gradual decline. In 10th grade, the decline continued through 2008; while for 12th graders, it halted in 2007 and then use rose slightly in 2008."

In 2008, 5.4 percent of 12th graders reported daily use of marijuana, up slightly from 5.1% in 2007. This compares with 6.0% in 1999 and 4.9% in 1996. Also in 2008, 24.6% of twelfth graders reported having had 5 or more drinks in a row in the last two weeks, the lowest reported percentage in the last 18 years. This 2008 rate continued a downward trend from a high of 31.5% in 1998. Finally in 2008, 5.4% of twelfth graders reported smoking 1/2 pack or more of cigarettes daily, again the lowest reported percentage in the last 18 years. This level of cigarette consumption by twelfth graders peaked in 1997 at 14.3%.

The US has higher rates of illicit drug use by young people than European nations, as noted by this Monitoring The Future survey released in 2001: "The MTF study found that in 1999 41% of tenth grade students in the United States had used marijuana or cannabis at least once in their lifetimes. All the participating European countries had a considerably lower rate of lifetime use, averaging 17%. This proportion varied among European countries from 1% in Romania to a high of 35% in France, the United Kingdom, and the Czech Republic. The US also had one of the lowest proportions of students seeing marijuana use as carrying a risk of harm to the user, and one of the lowest proportions saying that they personally disapprove of marijuana use (pp. 345 and 348).... The US also had the highest rates of use of most of the other illicit drugs studied, as well as marijuana, with the important exception of heroin. These included amphetamines, hallucinogens, cocaine, crack, and ecstasy."

Adolescents - Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign

"The media campaign [National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign] was authorized by the Drug-Free Media Campaign Act of 1998. This law, less than two pages in length, instructed the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (commonly referred to as the 'Drug Czar') to 'conduct a national media campaign ... for the purpose of reducing and preventing drug abuse among young people in the United States.'”

Researchers examining the effectiveness of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign reported in late 2003 that, "The NSPY [National Survey of Parents and Youth] did not find significant reductions in marijuana use either leading up to or after the Marijuana campaign for youth 12 to 18 years old between 2002 and 2003. Indeed there was evidence for an increase in past month and past year use among the target audience of 14- to 16-year-olds, although it appears that the increase was already in place in the last half of 2002, before the launch of the Marijuana Initiative. It will be worthwhile to track whether the nonsignificant decline from the second half of 2002 through the first half of 2003 is the beginning of a true trend. There was a significant decrease in lifetime marijuana use among youth 16 to 18 years of age from 2002 to 2003; however, since this significant decrease was not replicated in either the directly relevant past year or past month time periods, it is difficult to ascribe the change to the campaign."

In its evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, researchers from Westat and the Annenberg School of Communication in 2003 concluded: "In sum, the analysis of the NSPY data does not support a claim that use among the target audience of 14- to 16-year-olds has declined with the initiation of the Marijuana Initiative. Contrarily, it appears to have increased in the past year compared to prior measurement, although the increase appears to have occurred before the start of the Marijuana Initiative and was only maintained during the first half of 2003. The MTF [Monitoring the Future] data does show declines, particularly for 8th and 10th graders. However, these declines cannot be confidently attributed to the operation of the Campaign."

In the "Drug Use Among Youths, by Exposure to Prevention Messsages" section of its 1998 National Household Survey on Drug Use, SAMHSA concluded "youths’ exposure to prevention messages outside school, such as through the media, was fairly widespread but appeared to be unrelated to illicit drug use or being drunk on 51 or more days in the past year. Nearly 80% of youths who used illicit drugs and more than three-fourths of youths who were drunk on 51 or more days in the past year reported being exposed to prevention messages outside school."

In its 2006 evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, the General Accountability Office made this recommendation to Congress: "In light of the fact that the phase III evaluation of the media campaign yielded no evidence of a positive outcome in relation to teen drug use and congressional conferees’ indications of their intentions to rely on the Westat study, Congress should consider limiting appropriations for the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign beginning in the fiscal 2007 budget year until ONDCP is able to provide credible evidence of the effectiveness of exposure to the campaign on youth drug use outcomes or provide other credible options for a media campaign approach."

In its 2006 evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, the General Accountability Office concluded, "A well-designed and executed multiyear study of the impact of the ONDCP anti-drug media campaign on teen initiation of drug use, or cessation of drug use, shows disappointing results for the campaign. The study provides no evidence that the campaign had a positive effect in relation to teen drug use, and shows some indications of a negative impact."

In its 2006 evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, the General Accountability Office concluded, "The evaluation of the media campaign reinforces the lack of linkage between the media campaign and teen drug use behavior."

In its 2006 evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, the General Accountability Office concluded, "Unfavorable preliminary findings from the evaluation were reported by Westat in 2002. Beginning in 2002, ONDCP took a number of steps that were intended to strengthen the power of the campaign to achieve positive results. These steps included more rigorous ad copy testing and a concentration on anti-marijuana messages. However, the post-2002 results yielded no evidence of positive impacts and some evidence of negative and unintended consequences in relation to marijuana use. Specifically, exposure to advertisements during the redirected campaign was associated with higher rates of marijuana use initiation among youth who were prior nonusers of marijuana."

"As part of the Treasury and General Government Appropriation Act of 1998,(7) the Drug Free Media Campaign Act of 1998 required, among other things, the Office of National Drug Control Policy to conduct a national media campaign for the purpose of reducing and preventing drug abuse among young people in the United States.(8)"

"From fiscal year 1998 through fiscal year 2004, Congress appropriated $1.225 billion to support the campaign (table 1)"

"For fiscal year 2007, the President’s budget requested $120 million for campaign activities. The 2007 request represents an increase of $21 million above the fiscal year 2006 budget authority."

"The [Youth Anti-Drug Media] Campaign’s Media Match program has generated more than $1.22 billion in incremental media value for the Media Campaign since its inception. During FY 2008, the advertising contractor was able to negotiate more than the one-for-one match requirement. Interactive and Radio media placements generated the greatest additional impact for the Campaign by providing more than 10% above the match requirement."

The 2008, 2009, and 2010 budgets for the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign were respectively $60 million (Final), $70 million (Enacted), and $70 million (Requested). For all years since inception, Congressional appropriations for campaign total more than $1.7 billion.

In its evaluation of the ONDCP's Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, researchers from Westat and the Annenberg School of Communication in 2003 concluded: "In the previous reports, based on both favorable trends over time and cross-sectional associations, there was evidence supportive of Campaign effects on talking with children; on beliefs and attitudes regarding monitoring of children; and, in the case of the cross-sectional associations, on doing fun activities with them. These results still hold when Wave 7 parent reports are added, although youth reports of monitoring and talking behaviors are not consistent with parent reports and thus call into question the favorable changes in behavior that may be associated with the Campaign."